


Over Noodles

by Thistlerose



Category: Rent
Genre: F/F, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-16
Updated: 2011-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-14 19:39:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/152754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thistlerose/pseuds/Thistlerose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mark and Joanne meet for lunch.  Things have changed a little bit in the two years since that Christmas Eve at the Life Cafe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Over Noodles

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this about five years. I rediscovered it yesterday, while looking for something else, and decided to finish it.

Mark and Joanne meet for lunch on Mott Street. Mark hunches in his seat, his coat draped over his shoulders, and cradles the clay bowl full of steaming broth and thick udon noodles, letting the warmth seep into his cold, chapped hands. The restaurant smells deliciously of onions, chicken, garlic, and spices that he can't identify.

Outside, Mott Street is busy. Mark has his back to the restaurant's front window, but he can hear the constant stream of shoppers and sightseers going past. The restaurant's door bangs open frequently, and each time a blast of wintry air precedes the customer.

Joanne doesn't wait for him. Her chopsticks click against the clay and she tries not to slurp, mutters an apology when she accidentally does. The fact that she's so self-conscious makes Mark smile. She's different from Maureen, who just likes to hear herself; from Roger and Mimi, who make noise to prove they're alive; from Collins, who believes in manners but not convention.

"Your soup's going to get cold," Joanne says. "Or are you contemplating it as the subject of your next documentary?"

"Sure," says Mark, setting his bowl on the table. He picks up his chopsticks. "Man," he deadpans, "is like an udon noodle."

"What, pale and limp?"

Mark scowls. "Maureen's been telling lies about me again?"

"You walked right into that one. Come on, filmmaker. You need something profound if you're ever going to make it to Sundance."

"I'm not interested in profound." Mark stirs his soup idly while he thinks. "Man is like an udon noodle. He's pretty lame until you put him in hot water. That's _pathetic._ "

"Man is like an udon noodle," Joanne offers. "He just _exists_ to be sucked."

The corners of Mark's mouth creep upward. "By himself, he has no flavor. He has to mix with – what's this? Some kind of cabbage?" He pokes the crinkled green leaf. "I'd better stop or I'll hit a profundity."

"What's the matter with profound?"

"It's just not what I'm interested in doing. I want…"

"What?"

Mark spears the leaf and twirls it on his chopstick. "Just … everyday things. I don't want to make a _statement._ I guess I have to, or no one is going to want to see the damn thing, but I want…"

"What?" Joanne sets her chopsticks on the table and leans closer. "Hey, if anyone here overhears your idea and steals it, I can sue the pants off them."

"It's hard to think," Mark admits, still playing with the cabbage leaf. "Mimi's frail, Roger's taking care of her, Collins is busy teaching at that community college in Santa Fe, you and Maureen have your apartment, I'm working – sort of."

"It's not 'sort of' work; it _is_ work."

"I guess." He sighs and avoids her gaze.

"Hey." Joanne plucks the chopstick from between his fingers, and waggles it at him. "Do you get a weekly salary?"

"Yes," grumbles Mark.

"And tips, on top of that?"

"Sometimes."

"And Roger sold his song. _And_ he's working too?"

" _Yes._ "

"Then there's no 'sort of.' There's nothing noble about starving, if you can do something about it. Not everyone can, you know. Life is shitty for a lot of people, but you - you’ve got some things going for you. You’ve got some resources and some talent. Things could be a lot worse.”

"Like you'd know," says Mark.

"Hey." Joanne pokes his hand with the chopstick. Hard. "Living with Maureen has taught me _plenty._ I know there's a difference between suffering for your art and treating suffering like an art."

“Fine, fine.” Mark holds his hands up in surrender. “You have a point, Joanna Jefferson, Esquire.”

“Of course I do.”

Mark sighs. “I’m sorry. Really. Can I have my chopsticks back?”

She gives him a measuring look, one eyebrow arched.

“Unless you really do want me to be a starving artist.”

At that, Joanne’s lips fold in a smile. Nevertheless, she gives his hands a gentle whack with the chopsticks before handing them over to him. As he uses them to pick up a thin slice of kamaboko, she leans forward on her elbows and continues in a lower, almost gentle tone.

“Look, none of us are where we thought we’d be by now. Am I right? Maureen thought she’d have her name in lights, and me, I thought I’d be raking in dough, taking down corrupt CEOs and politicians. Just because I’m not, it doesn’t mean I’m not proud of what I do. Just because Maureen doesn’t drive me up the fucking wall sometimes, it doesn’t mean I don’t love her. God, I love that girl, even though, I swear, there are times I’d like to…” She trails off, looking down at her forearms.

Mark slurps down a thick noodle and says, “Hey. Don’t censor yourself on my account. It’s me, remember. I’ve been there.”

“Honey, don’t remind me.”

Mark grins. He doesn’t remember exactly when he stopped resenting Joanne for stealing Maureen. It might have been that Christmas Eve two years ago, when they were celebrating Maureen’s protest at the Life Café, and Maureen kept sending Joanne back to the lot to take care of her equipment. At one point, watching Joanne button her overcoat for yet another foray into the cold, Mark thought in a dreamlike haze, _Shit, I’m glad that isn’t me anymore._

If Mark envies anyone these days, he supposes it’s Maureen. Not that he has any fantasies about Joanne, who’s definitely pretty, but who has about as much interest in him - sexually - as he has in, say, Roger or Collins. (Not that he doesn’t sometimes think about Joanne _and_ Maureen, especially when Roger and Mimi are off somewhere, and he’s alone in bed at night…)

What he envies, he supposes, is that constant companionship. Maureen might grumble that Joanne is a neatnik do-gooder, and she isn’t wrong, but there’s almost always a gleam in her beautiful brown eyes, and a flush to her cheeks as she says goodnight to Mark and heads in the directions of the subway that will take her uptown to the apartment she shares with Joanne. It must be nice, he thinks, having someone who doesn’t just love you and put up with your bullshit, but who keeps you on your toes and doesn’t let you backslide.

Not that he’s alone all that often. Some of the customers at the restaurant where he works could stand to be taken down a notch, but his boss is actually okay, as are some of his co-workers. He has his friends. Roger and Mimi love him, in their way, and Collins is trying to convince him to come out to Santa Fe and get a job there.

These are all very good things, excellent reasons to keep pushing forward and not admit defeat and run back to his parents in Scarsdale.

He wonders what Maureen does for Joanne. Probably makes sure she has fun - which is important.

 _Fun is important. How fucking profound, filmmaker._

“Anyway,” Joanne says, “maybe you’re not where you thought you’d be. But you aren’t so bad off, and I think it’s time you started acknowledging that. I’m not saying you should walk around with a stupid grin on your face all the time, because that would be creepy. But, you know…”

“Yeah.” And he does. It’s taken him a while - almost two years - but, yeah. It isn’t that things could be worse. Of course they could be worse. It’s that they’re really not _so_ bad. For him, anyway. Mimi is frail, but she’s holding on. Roger and Collins … they’re strong. For now. They’re all holding on for now. Holding onto one another in whatever way they can.

Mark looks at Joanne and says, “This is my treat, by the way.” The words are out of his mouth before he’s given himself time to think them through. He actually doesn’t remember the last time he said those words.

Joanne raises both eyebrows. “You sure?”

“Yeah.” There’s an uneasiness in his stomach, which quickly goes away. “Yeah,” he says again. “My treat.” It feels good to say it.

1/16/2011


End file.
